J. J. Castro

J. J. Castro
University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria | ULPGC · Centro de Biodiversidad y Gestión Ambiental (BIOGES)

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119
Publications
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Publications

Publications (119)
Article
Full-text available
Spearfishing regulation in The Canary Islands (CIs) has been a conflictive subject for years since it restricts the activity in its spatial access to resources, with proponents both for and against these measures. Understanding the range of perceptions between social groups or stakeholders is important when designing and developing successful manag...
Article
Full-text available
Introduction: Sea urchin diseases have been documented in several locations worldwide, with reported occurrences of bacterial, protozoan, fungal, and algal infections. Objective: This study aimed to investigate pathogen agents in populations of Arbacia lixula and Paracentrotus lividus along the coast of Gran Canaria Island (Central-East Atlantic,...
Article
Full-text available
Length-weight relationships (LWRs) were estimated for 15 mesopelagic shrimp species off the Canary Islands (central eastern Atlantic). Total length, cephalothorax length and total weight were taken for individuals collected during three research campaigns using a commercial semi-pelagic trawl net. The most represented families among the collected s...
Article
Full-text available
In this study, we explored the feasibility of using the beaks of the African cuttlefish Sepia bertheloti for age estimation and growth analysis. The rostrum sagittal section (RSS) of the lower beak was the most suitable region in the species. It was applied in samples caught off Morocco and Guinea-Bissau between June 2018 and January 2020. A maximu...
Article
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We report the first case of partial albinism in the Critically Endangered angelshark, Squatina squatina. The encounter with this specimen took place while SCUBA diving on the beach of Tufia, located on the east coast of the island of Gran Canaria on 2 April 2021. This is also the first confirmed finding of an albino elasmobranch specimen in the Can...
Article
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The presence of spiny butterfly rays, Gymnura altavela, in waters less than 20 m deep off the Canary Islands shows marked seasonality, with relatively high abundances in the summer and autumn. Large aggregations of sometimes hundreds of individuals, primarily females, appear in specific shallow areas of the archipelago and seem to be associated wit...
Article
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Globally, elasmobranchs have suffered severe population declines and are, therefore, under an urgent necessity of protection, particularly along the Northeastern Atlantic realm. However, a lack of ecological (e.g., abundance) knowledge across this realm limits the implementation of adequate conservation and management actions. Here, we collected 4,...
Poster
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Canary Islands, in particular Gran Canaria Island, show spiny butterfly ray aggregative behaviour in different beaches, and it seems to be related with the temperature variation.
Poster
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Telemetry is a technique used to safeguard the misinformation about elasmobranchs, in this case acoustic tags are being used to find out the presence of spiny butterfly ray on the coast of Gran Canaria
Poster
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Introducción: El tiburón Angelote (Squatina squatina) también conocido como peje ángel en el archipiélago canario, es una especie de tiburón bentónico que se puede encontrar en toda la zona costera de las Islas Canarias. La especie está clasificada, por la Lista Roja de UICN, como en peligro crítico de extinción, debido principalmente a la sobrepes...
Poster
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Introducción: La Mantelina, Gymnura altavela (Linnaeus, 1758), catalogada como vulnerable en el atlántico y en peligro crítico en el mediterráneo (Lista Roja de la UICN), ha sufrido y un agotamiento importante debido a la presión pesquera en los últimos 50 años, tanto por el sector profesional como por el sector de la pesca recreativo, debido a que...
Article
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Batoids, distributed from shallow to abyssal depths, are considerably vulnerable to anthropogenic threats. Data deficiencies on the distribution patterns of batoids, however, challenge their effective management and conservation. In this study, we took advantage of the particular geological and geomorphological configuration of the Canary Islands,...
Article
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This work is the result of an international research effort to determine the main impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on marine recreational fishing. Changes were assessed on (1) access to fishing, derived from lockdowns and other mobility restrictions; (2) ecosystems, because of alterations in fishing intensity and human presence; (3) the blue econom...
Article
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Covid-19 pandemic has affected worldwide in many different ways. Fisheries around the world are not an exception due to the long term isolation and the non-activities period suffered. To do an evaluation of its impact on the fishing sectors in the Canary Islands, 87 online and phone questionnaires were carried out between July and September 2020, c...
Article
The ecological system conformed by the islands of Tenerife and La Gomera (Canary Islands) is characterized though the trophic network. The indicators obtained by the Ecopath model show a stressed and still developing ecosystem, probably related to inadequate management of the fisheries that takes place in this area, focused on high trophic level sp...
Article
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Notoscopelus resplendens is an abundant myctophid in the region of the central‑eastern Atlantic. As with a majority of other myctophid species, this species performs vertical migration, playing a key role in the oceanic food web and in carbon sequestration. We examined the reproductive biology of N. resplendens based on 579 specimens caught between...
Chapter
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Autonomous sailboats are silent surface vehicles which are well suited for acoustic monitoring. The integration of an acoustic receiver in an unmanned surface vehicle has a large potential for population monitoring as it permits to report geo-referenced detections in real time, so that researchers can adapt monitoring strategies as data arrive. In...
Article
Abralia veranyi and Abraliopsis morisii were the most abundant cephalopods caught during epipelagic and mesopelagic surveys off the Canary Islands and accounted for 26% and 35% of the cephalopod catch, respectively. Diel vertical migration patterns were observed in both species. At night, A. veranyi was recorded at depths as shallow as 38–90 m, whe...
Article
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The distribution of the Rough triggerfish, Canthidermis maculata, has been established in the East Atlantic for the west coast of subtropical central Africa, from Cape Verde Islands to Gabon, but with some records also toward Angola. The capture of a single specimen (TL: 289.6 mm) by tuna vessels in the Canary Islands, expand the distribution range...
Presentation
Recreational fishing shows a growing number of followers, but at the same time it is a difficult fishery to assess, due to the lack of records of the activity and captures. In the present work it has been analysed the information collected from 118 spearfishing tournaments held in the Canary Islands between 2007 and 2017. The number of recreational...
Article
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In this study, we used a historical collection of photographs taken by recreational fishers from 1940 to 2014, at the island of Gran Canaria, to show both a significant decrease in the mean total length of Epinephelus marginatus and a concurrent change in the composition of captures. Before 1980, the mean total length of fish caught and photographe...
Article
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Total marine fisheries catches within the exclusive economic zone of the Canary Islands, Spain, were reconstructed to include catches from the various small-scale artisanal fleets and their discards, as well as subsistence, recreational and other unreported catch. Total reconstructed catch was estimated at 38600 t in 1950, increasing to 81200 t in...
Article
Two symmetrical diacylguanidines, triophamine (1) and limaciamine (2), have been found to occur in three Polyceridae nudibranchs from Canary Islands. These compounds were previously reported from taxonomically related species collected from distinct geographical areas. Due to the peculiar occurrence of 1 and 2 in Polyceridae nudibranchs and, in par...
Technical Report
La anómala presencia de bancos de ejemplares del tamboril oceánico (Lagocephalus lagocephalus) en Canarias parece haber estar motivada por un calentamiento anormal del agua de mar en el verano de 2017, asociados a fenómenos oceanográficos y climáticos (aumento de la temperatura por encima de 23ºC, disminución del viento, polvo sahariano). En genera...
Poster
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The presence of Sthenoteuthis pteropus in the Canary waters (between 27º5N-20ºN and 13ºW-18º5W) is related to migratory aspects in the months of July and November, according with an increase in sea surface temperature. The range of sizes found in the study area is associated with a part of the life cycle of the squid, not finding small size or larg...
Poster
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The Deep Scattering layer (DSL) around The Canary Islands (Central-east Atlantic) waters is of great ecological importance due to the abundance of mesopelagic species. During oceanographic surveys carried out by the O/V La Bocaina between 1997 and 2002, the DSL was assessed using acoustic and fishing techniques (pelagic trawls). The abundance regis...
Article
A mass-balance trophic model was built in order to describe the impact of the different fleets that operate in the Gran Canaria marine ecosystem between 2005 and 2010. This is the first food-web model developed in the Canary Islands, and results were presented and compared with other ecosystems that have been modeled in Atlantic and Mediterranean c...
Article
Full-text available
Total marine fisheries catches within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of the Canary Islands, Spain, were reconstructed to include catches of the various small-scale artisanal fleets and their discards, as well as subsistence, recreational, and other unreported catch. Total reconstructed catch was estimated at 38,600 t in 1950, increasing to 81,20...
Article
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The reproductive biology of the planehead filefish, Stephanolepis hispidus, in the waters of the Canary Islands area was studied. The study was conducted with a sample of 906 specimens from 8.9 to 25.9 cm in total length (TL) that were caught in fish traps from February 1998 to August 1999. Females predominated in the catches, and the sex ratio of...
Article
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The information provided by the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) on captures of skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) in the central-east Atlantic has a number of limitations, such as gaps in the statistics for certain fleets and the level of spatiotemporal detail at which catches are reported. As a result, the q...
Article
The box crab (Paramola cuvieri) was relatively frequent in trap catches from 288 to 906 m depth off the Canary Islands (central-east Atlantic), the greatest abundance being recorded between 400 and 700 m. From winter to the beginning of summer, a displacement of adult crabs from deeper waters (800 m) to areas of intermediate depths (600 m) was note...
Article
The homing ability of the rock pool blenny Parablennius parvicornis was studied at a rocky shore on Gran Canaria (Canary Islands, Spain).A total of 140 fish were tagged in five different rock pools and 100 of them were displaced from their 10 original site, during low tide. This blenny species shows great site fidelity and is able to return home fr...
Article
A specimen of West African fiddler crab, Uca tangeri, was collected in October 2011 on the north-east coast of Gran Canaria (Canary Islands). This species is frequent along the shores of the east Atlantic from Portugal to Angola, but is very rare in the Canary Islands. There is only a previous record from 1971, but that did not report the place whe...
Article
Two exploratory trap fishing surveys were carried out from February to April, and from June to July 2003, respectively, at depths ranging between 200 and 1200 m, with the objective to evaluate deep fishery resources of the Canary Archipelago. Bathynectes maravigna was relatively frequent in catches, as an indication of its abundance in deep waters...
Article
Full-text available
Solari, A. P., Santamaría, M. T. G., Borges, M. F., Santos, A. M. P., Mendes, H., Balguerías, E., Díaz Cordero, J. A., Castro, J. J., and Bas, C. 2010. On the dynamics of Sardina pilchardus: orbits of stability and environmental forcing. – ICES Journal of Marine Science, 67: 1565–1573. The dynamics of Sardina pilchardus in Iberian upwelling are exa...
Article
Two exploratory trap fishing surveys were carried out from February to April and from June to July 2003, respectively, at depths ranging between 300 and 1200 m, with the objective to assess deep fishery resources of the Canary Archipelago. Despite the fact that the deep-water red crab, Chaceon affinis is a virtually unknown species for the artisana...
Article
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The effect of temperature on the common octopus life cycle has been well studied. However, how other climatic patterns affect them is poorly understood. The present work emphasises the importance of the temperature on common octopus catches by the small-scale trap fishery off the Canary Islands, and also highlights the effect of the North Atlantic...
Article
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Significant differences were found between males and females in the fragmocone, external cone and widths of the cuttlebone in Sepia officinalis caught in the small-scale trap fishery off Gran Canaria Island (Spain). It is suggested that: (a) differences may depend on morphological adaptations of females for egg laying; (b) cuttlebones represent ove...
Article
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Ganzedo, U., Zorita, E., Solari, A. P., Chust, G., Santana del Pino, A., Polanco, J., and Castro, J. J. 2009. What drove tuna catches between 1525 and 1756 in southern Europe? – ICES Journal of Marine Science, 66: 1595–1604. From 1525 to 1756, catches of tuna in almadrabas (trapnets) fluctuated greatly, but the overall trend was a downwards one. Th...
Article
The capture of two females of Ocythoe tuberculata during the summer of 2006, in the North-east Atlantic is reported. This pelagic cephalopod species are rare beyond subtropical waters and were caught at the sea surface by two live bait boats. The appearance of this species in the area is related with an anomalous sea warming. During the summer of 2...
Article
Full-text available
Significant differences were found between males and females in the fragmocone, external cone and widths of the cuttlebone in Sepia officinalis caught in the small-scale trap fishery off Gran Canaria Island (Spain). It is suggested that: (a) differences may depend on morphological adaptations of females for egg laying; (b) cuttlebones represent ove...
Article
El análisis de los parámetros de crecimiento y reproducción de la cabrilla (Serranus atricauda) en las islas de Gran Canaria y La Palma deja entrever que existe una importante diferenciación geográfica entre ambos grupos poblacionales. Se observa que los individuos procedentes de La Palma tienen una tasa de crecimiento que duplica la de los de Gran...
Article
Catches of the slender sunfish Ranzania laevis were reported off the coastline of the island of Gran Canaria, the Canary Islands, Spain in May-June 2001, apparently associated with a sudden west-east warming process of the sea surface in the central Atlantic.
Article
Adult males Abudefduf luridus produced sounds during aggressive interactions, although not all aggressive interactions were associated with sounds. Such sounds were always related to characteristic swimming movements during an aggressive display or territorial defence. The sound was a combination of several sonic pulses, with most energy concentrat...
Chapter
Full-text available
La materia "Introducción a las Ciencias de la Naturaleza" es una asignatura de libre elección para los alumnos del Curso Preparatorio para Mayores de 25 años que organiza la Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. Sus contenidos han sido escogidos y preparados por un grupo de profesores doctores del Departamento de Biología de la Universidad, pa...
Article
Ambient light levels were manipulated to vary potential predation risk, and aggressive behaviour was examined. Juveniles of white-seabream (Diplodus sargus cadenati) interacted aggressively more frequently at intermediate light intensity (500 lux), being agonistic interactions at higher (3000 lux) or lower (5 lux) illumination less frequent. Aggr....
Article
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Ceratothoa steindachneri (Isopoda: Cymothoidae) and Pentacapsula cutanea (Myxozoa: Pentacapsulidae) parasites infecting the blacktail-comber (Serranus atricauda) were considered suitable as biological tags for stock identification around the islands of La Palma and Gran Canaria, in the Western and Eastern areas of the Canarian archipelago, respecti...
Article
Full-text available
The growth of the planedhead filefish Stephanolepis hispidus was studied on individuals sampled from a small-scale fishery off Gran Canaria (Canary Islands, central-east Atlantic) between March 1998 and August 1999. The age of the sampled individuals, which ranged from 0 to 3 years, was estimated using both the length frequency distribution and the...
Article
The number of aggressive interactions displayed by juveniles of Diplodus sargus cadenati increases progressively in proportion to the number of intruders, with an upper threshold of more than 16 to 18 intruder fish. Beyond this density, resident aggressiveness decreases. The number of aggressive interactions that the resident fish devotes to expell...
Article
An immense variety of fish may, on occasions, aggregate around or beassociated with floating structures such as drifting algae, jelliedzooplankton, whales, floats or anchored fish aggregating devices (ineffect, there are over 333 fish species belonging to 96 familiesrecorded in the literature). Several hypotheses have been advanced to explain this...
Article
The common octopus, Octopus vulgaris Cuvier, 1797 is the most important cephalopod species in catches of the artisanal trap fishery in Canary Islands waters. Based on monthly samplings carried out off Gran Canaria (Canary Islands), 760 specimens of the common octopus, ranging from 4.8 to 165 mm ventral mantle length, were studied from June 1996 to...
Article
An immense variety of fish may, on occasions, aggregate around or beassociated with floating structures such as drifting algae, jelliedzooplankton, whales, floats or anchored fish aggregating devices (ineffect, there are over 333 fish species belonging to 96 familiesrecorded in the literature). Several hypotheses have been advanced to explain this...
Article
In Octopus vulgaris regular patterns of activity and evidence of endogenous rhythms induced by the light–dark cycles have been reported in both field and laboratory animals. These endogenous rhythms may be reflected in the chitinous structure of the beaks. If rings on the lateral walls of the upper beaks are laid down daily and can be accurately co...
Article
We report the capture of a specimen of Selene dorsalis (Gill, 1862), a rare species in waters north of the Cape Verde Islands and Senegal. This is the first time that it has been recorded among the ichthyofauna of the Canary Islands.
Article
Los emisarios submarinos son estructuras artificiales diseñadas para la gestión de aguas residuales, que pueden ser potencialmente colonizados por comunidades bentóni-cas. Pudiéndose considerar como un arrecife artificial, donde las poblaciones asentadas encuentran alimento, protección y refugio. Estudios revisados por Helvey (1985) han mostrado la...
Article
This paper reports, for the first time, the existence of external digestion of decapod larvae by the common octopus, Octopusvulgaris (Mollusca: Cephalopoda), paralarvae. Zoeae of three crab species were externally digested, leaving a whole and empty exoskeleton. The attack sequence on these prey is also described, and divided into the same three ph...
Article
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The capture of a specimen of Holocentrus ascensionis (Osbeck, 1765), a species previously unrecorded in the Eastern Atlantic north of Gabon, is reported from Gran Canaria Island (Canary Islands, Central-East Atlantic).
Article
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Sixteen fish aggregation devices (FADs) were deployed in 50 to 500 m deep of water in the Canary Islands. Species composition and abundance were determined by visual census carried out by diverse on 55 occasions from April to October 1995 and from August 1996 to May 1997. A total of 15 species representing nine families of fish were observed. Pseud...
Article
Full-text available
The size, growth and spawning characteristics of pompano dolphin (N=150) and common dolphinfish (N=36) caught off the Canary Islands between May and September 1995 and between July and September 1996 were examined. Fork length (FL) of pompano dolphin was in the range 28.3-62.8 cm. In 1995, the mean length increased significantly from June to Septem...
Conference Paper
La zona de aguas costeras al Este & Gran Canaria, desde la Península de Gando hasta la Punta de Arinaga. está siendo estudiada de cara a su posible declaración como Reserva Marina de Interés Pesquero. A partir de los datos suministrados por el Instituto Nacional de Meteorología en su estación de Gando (Aeropuerto de Gran Canaria) y los datos propio...